A Stitch in Time
by Kamakaze Kheri
Summary: Strangely, it was comforting to think that time had stopped for him and the girl; that the whole world was holding its breath for them.  Written for PokePrompts Blitz 004


**I know, it's been a long time, but I figured I'd get something up this month. Hopefully I'll be able to update some of my chapter stories now that I've got this out of the way. We'll see, aha. This was written for the PokePrompts Blitz Competition for this month.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Pokemon or its characters, just the idea for the story.

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Once upon a time, in a tiny little village in the land of Sinnoh, there lived a boy and a girl. The girl was patient and kind and caring, the way all little girls should be, while the boy was adventurous and rambunctious, like a bird waiting to take flight. It was greatly frowned upon in the kingdom to be friends with those of the opposite gender, but if there was anything that the boy and the girl had in common, it was that they were quite rebellious. And so they made a deal that at a quarter to one every day they would meet somewhere.

"Where should we meet?" the boy asked as he twisted his sunshine yellow hair between his fingers. He frowned at its unruliness and how it glittered in the fading sun. Boys' hair weren't supposed to glitter.

"There's a wood out behind the village," the girl said slowly. "We could meet there, at the lime-tree and the pond in the clearing."

The boy nodded. "Alright," he confirmed. "But you better be there on time or else I'm going to fine you a million dollars!" The girl giggled in response as the two parted ways, promising to meet at the lime-tree in the clearing of the wood behind the village at a quarter to one and not a minute later.

However, as life often goes, things do not always go according to plan. The boy, of course, showed up right on time, glancing at his clock carefully. It had been a gift from his father, a Duke of the Pokemon League, and hung on a chain next to the key hole cover that had fallen off the upstairs washroom a week prior to that day. As the seconds ticked by, the boy watched as the long hand on the clock moved past the nine, proving that the little girl was late. Angry, the boy kicked at the tree, jumping when something hit the ground next to him. To his surprise, he saw that a lime had fallen from the tree's branches and he picked it up, turning it over carefully in his hands.

The boy had never tasted a lime before and he looked around, trying to see if the little girl was coming. When he saw that she wasn't, the boy frowned and peeled at the protective covering of the fruit. The flesh inside was a greeny-yellow, like the grass in the summer when it wasn't healthy enough for their Miltank to eat, and recklessly, the boy bit into the fruit, savouring the bitterness of it.

A minute later, the little girl burst into the clearing, panting heavily. She knew she was late for her meeting with the boy and was worrying about whether or not he would actually fine her when she realized that he was no where to be seen either. In fact, the only other living creature in the clearing with her was a Politoed who was sitting on the edge of the pond.

"That hypocrite," the girl muttered. "Telling me to show up on time and then not arrive himself. Hrumph." She huffed and spun on her heel, glancing out through the trees in hopes that the boy would arrive soon. However, there was no sign of him and the girl frowned, reaching into the pocket of her dress for the golden ball that she had brought with her for them to play with. The girl began to toss it in the air, watching it soar high into the air before catching it nimbly in her hand. She found this quite enjoyable and continued to play with the ball until she missed and it tumbled from her hand and straight into the pond.

The little girl was shocked. The golden ball had been her favourite toy, a gift from the little boy when she had been younger, and now it was gone, swallowed by the depths of the pond. She refused to cry, however, and instead, got down on her hands and knees and peered into the water. The glittering surface of the ball could be seen faintly, but the little girl knew that she would never be able to reach it.

"Oh, what am I going to do?" the girl muttered, sitting back on her heels.

"Perhaps I can be of assistance?"

Startled, the girl yelped and turned, searching for the source of the voice. The only other creature in the clearing was the Politoed, who still hadn't moved away from the edge of the pond.

"Did you just speak?" the girl asked, peering suspiciously at the frog-like Pokemon.

"Indeed, I did," the frog replied.

"But, Pokemon can't speak," the little girl said slowly. The Politoed cocked its head to the side and smiled a bit of a tentative smile.

"Do you want to hear a secret?" he asked the girl, watching her expression carefully. The girl shrugged and so the Politoed continued. "If I retrieve that ball for you, you have to listen to my story. Deal?"

"Deal," the girl said eagerly. She wanted her golden ball back badly and she had forgotten that a Politoed would be the perfect Pokemon to rescue it for her.

Without hesitation, the Politoed splashed into the water before diving under the rippling surface, his form growing blurry as he sank to the bottom of the pond. The little girl waited anxiously, her hands twisting in her lap as she waited for the Pokemon to return. The seconds ticked away and time seemed to stretch, as if a minute was suddenly an hour. Finally, bubbles began floating to the surface and the clear glass top of the pond rippled as the Politoed appeared, a golden ball clutched in its mouth as it paddled into the shallow waters of the pond.

"You did it!" the girl exclaimed happily, helping the Pokemon from the pond and accepting the ball from him. She was about to stand and turn away when the Politoed croaked out, "Wait! You promised to hear me out."

Guiltily, the girl turned around again. She hadn't really wanted to wait and listen to what the frog had had to say, but she felt obliged to now. "Fine," she said. "Tell me all about your fine life."

The Politoed scowled and leaned against the lime tree, watching the girl carefully in case she tried to bolt. "I wasn't always a Politoed, you know," he said and when the girl rolled his eyes he tutted. "I don't mean like I was once a Poliwag, I mean ... I was a human once." This received the desired effect as the little girl's eyes widened. "I was an impatient person before, always telling my friends to not be late and to be on time so that we could get stuff done. Really, I just wanted to spend every minute of the day with them, but that didn't always work. I was so impatient one day while meeting my friends in this clearing that I ate a lime from the tree. What I didn't know was that the limes would turn you into a Pokemon and prevent you from leaving the clearing. The only way I can be saved now is for a little girl to kiss me."

The little girl, who had been steadily leaning closer to the Politoed to listen, backed away quickly. "If you think I'm going to kiss you, you're wrong," she informed him. "How do I know that you're not lying and you're just trying to transfer a disease to me?"

"Please," the Pokemon said, rolling his eyes. "Do you think I would be so immature. But I couldn't help over hear earlier that you were waiting for someone."

The girl blushed, her cheeks flaming. "I was," she said. "But he's probably at home with a cold or something, which is why he isn't here."

"But he was here," the Politoed replied. "I saw him not too long ago."

There was a brief pause as the girl stopped at the edge of the clearing, about to make her way back to the village. "You did?" she asked, hopefully. "Could you tell me where he went from here?"

"It'll cost you that kiss," the Politoed answered, rather pointedly, the girl noticed.

In her mind, the girl struggled. She didn't want to kiss the Politoed at all, but she desperately wanted to know where the little boy had gone. He could be her only hope, but he could also be lying. She fiddled anxiously with the key that hung from her neck, an old rusted thing she had found in the cellar one night while looking for the canned peaches. The key to all relationships, the boy had told her, was honesty and trust. If she wanted to find the little boy so badly, she would just have to trust the frog.

"Fine," she huffed, stepping back into the clearing and straightening the hat that perched on her head. "I'll give you a kiss. But if you don't turn into a human when I kiss you, you better get out of my sights quick before I send someone in here to catch you."

The Politoed nodded quickly, hopping towards her gleefully. With a sigh, the little girl bent over and closed her eyes. The last thing she saw before her lips touched the Pokemon's was her best friend, his straw-coloured hair flying in the breeze.

With a slight gasp, the girl felt herself tipping forward as the Politoed pulled at her. His lips didn't feel as slimy anymore and the hands that had been holding onto her shoulders felt bigger and the fingers more slender. The legs that were tangled with hers were surely much too long to be the Politoed's and when the girl opened her eyes she couldn't help but exclaim.

"Barry!" she yelped, peering down at the boy. "Were you-? Did that-? The Politoed ..."

The boy laughed. "Dawn, calm down," he said, "or I'm going to fine you a million dollars." He watched the girl sit up and roll off him so that she was sitting on the grass next to him, glancing at his face nervously as if he might randomly turn back into a Pokemon.

"Everything you said ... about eating the lime ... was that true?" she asked finally. The boy nodded his head, still lying on his back and glancing up at the sky. He touched the clock that hung from his neck and glanced it, surprised to see that it was as if no time had passed at all. The hand was firmly stuck at 12:47, though he was sure that it must have been at least ten minutes since he had arrived in the clearing. Strangely, it was comforting to think that time had stopped for him and the girl; that the whole world was holding its breath for them.

"Are you alright, Barry?" the girl asked, her face appearing above his and the boy grinned.

"I am now," he replied. "Not much gets better than a kiss from you, Dawn." He laughed as the girl blushed madly and he sat up so quickly that they almost cracked heads. "I think we need to leave something here," he said finally. "A reminder of what happened here. It's not every day that you kiss your best friend."

"What do you want to leave?" the girl asked, clutching her golden ball protectively to her chest. She had gone through so much to get it back, she wasn't about to leave it behind again.

The boy carefully pulled the clock and broken door lock from his neck and held it up to let the afternoon sun glitter off its surface. "This is what I'm leaving," he announced. "The clock doesn't seem to work anymore anyway. Guess turning into a Pokemon'll do that to clocks."

The girl laughed nervously and watched as the boy hung the necklace carefully from the lowest branch of the lime tree. "Maybe I'll leave something too then," she said, standing to join the boy at the tree. She pulled the key from around the neck and glanced at the large open space in the top. The hole was meant for decoration, but after sizing it up carefully, the girl pulled the clock from the boy's chain and fit it neatly into the hole in her key. "Perfect," she said with a smile, clipping the new accessory to the bottom of the door lock.

"It's like they were made to fit together," the boy commented softly, watching as the necklace twirled gently from the little girl's touch.

"Kind of like us?" the girl asked cautiously, threading her fingers between his.

"Yeah," the boy said, his smile as bright as the sun, "exactly like us."


End file.
